What Causes Warts

What You Must Know to Avoid Getting Warts

By Lee Dobbins

Over the ages, there have been many theories as to what causes warts with perhaps the most popular being the theory that they come from toads! While toads are a little warty in appearance, rest assured that you cannot get warts by handling them. You can get warts, however from other people that have warts. This is because warts are actually caused by a virus which attacks your skin cells causing them to grow at a faster rate than they should which in turn creates a benign tumor commonly called a wart.

The virus that causes warts is called the human papillomavirus. It can be spread from person to person and it can also spread from one place on your body to another. The virus gets in through breaks in the skin and it thrives in warm moist places so it is often associated with public showers and locker rooms where you would often have skin contact with wet floors where other people have also been walking.

Taking a closer look at what causes warts, one might note that warts could be avoided by always wearing something on your feet at the pool or gym and avoiding sharing personal items with other people such as razors and towels. The interesting thing about the human papilloma virus is that it has an incubation period and can take up to nine months after exposure to actually show up as a wart.

While most anyone can get warts, not everyone does. Some people seem to be more susceptible to them than others. Often younger people under the age of 30 and people with reduced immune function are prone to warts. That's because warts, being a virus, would have a better chance of settling in on people who were ill-prepared to fight it off. Not everyone who is exposed to the human papillomavirus will get warts because most people have antibodies in their system that will kill off the virus before it can affect their skin cells.

Warts can appear anywhere on your body, but are most often seen on the hands, elbows, knees and ankles. Plantar warts are those found in the bottom of your feet and, while they might be different in appearance than warts and other places they are still the same type of wart just compressed and flattened due to the pressure of walking on them. Genital warts, are an extremely contagious type of wart in the genital area also caused by the human papillomavirus.

So now that you know what causes warts, you're probably wondering how to get rid of them. There are actually several treatments however, it should be noted, that not every treatment works the same on every one. If you have tried a treatment and it hasn't worked, don't feel like you're "stuck with your warts", try another treatment until you find one that does work for you. Sometimes warts go away on their own, but if you can wait that long come up with a treatment plan and try many different things until you find something that works effectively for you.

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